
^^Q' 



wentietb €entury 
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Vol. 1. No. 1. 



September, 1899. 




Selections 

FROM 

IRONQUILL 




Issued Monthly. 



Price, $1 per year. 



CRANE & COMPANY, PUBLISHERS, 
TOPEKA, KANSAS. 



Supplemental Methods. 

A NEW BOOK. 

By BELLE VARVEL HOUSTON. 

Designed for use as a manual and supplement to the State books in 
Reading, History, and Geography. The work presented has been chosen 
with special reference to these books. 

Some special features — 

1. Reference Dictionary, explaining Literary, Historical, and 

Mythological references found in the school readers. 

2. Stories and sketches of Authors, supplementing the bare 

facts given in the biographical sketches in readers. 

3. Pages from European history, which concern the history 

of our own country. 

4. Description of decisive battles in American history. 

5. Dictionary of Political Parties and factions. 

6. Collection of Geographical legends. 

7. Model Lessons. 

8. Methods new, practical, many of which are entirely original, 

and all successfully used by the Author. 

9. Suggestions for opening exercises — devices for bad days, 

etc., etc. 



FERRELL'S MANUAL OF ARITHMETIC. 

By J. A. FERRELL, B. S.,C. E. 

Prepared especially for school teachers and advanced students of Arith- 
metic, as a manual or guide to the systematic development of the mind 
in studying mathematical relations, finding premises and developing solu- 
tions. 
Special features of the work are — 

The Plan of Expressing Solutions. 
The Study of the Nature of Problems. 
The Treatment of Ratios and Proportion. 
The Treatment of the Signs + and -. 

One Volume, Full Cloth. 50 cents, prepaid. 

CRANE & COMPANY, TOPEKA, KANSAS. 



THE TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 
AND SCHOOL READINGS 

UNDER THE EDITORIAL SUPERVISION OF 

W. M. DAVIDSON 

SUPERINTENDENT OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS OF TOPEKA, KANSAS 



SELECTIONS FROM IRONQUILL 



-TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS AND SCHOOL READINGS 



SELECTIONS FROM 

IRONQUILL 



SELECTED BY 



sJ 



W. M. DAVIDSON 

Superintendent of Schools of the City of Topeka 



Crane & Company, Publishers 

Topeka, Kansas 

1899 



49^V18 

Copyrighted by 

Okane & Company, Topeka, Kansas 

1899 



^O COPIES BECEIVEU. 

»ECOKt> OOPV, 









Page. 
.. 11 
.. 15 



CONTENTS 

Biographical 

Qui vera — Kansas 

18 
The Sunset Marmaton 

21 

To-Day ^_^ 

The Now 

24 
The Kansas October 

25 

Three States 

26 
The Bird Song 

28 
Shadow 

9Q 

The Washerwoman's Song -^ 

31 

Type 3., 

• The Old Pioneer 

33 
Winter 

34 

John Brown 

^ . 36 

Requiem 

37 
The Protest 

„ , 38 

Hearts 

39 

Decoration Day 

_ 42 

Dewey 

43 

Frauds 

44 

Crlory 

The Geese and the Cranes 

Millions 

47 

Failure 

_, . 49 

Elusion 

Serenade 

(5) 



6 CONTENTS 

Pagb. 

loline 51 

The Child of Fate 54 

The Kansas Dug-Out 56 

History 57 

The Prairie Storm 58 

Whither 59 

The Palindrome 60 

The Old Kansas Veteran 61 

Ad Astra Per Aspera 62 

The Organ-Grinder 63 

Sampson 67 

There is Something in a Flag 68 

The Telegraph Wire 70 

The Blizzard 71 

The Old Cabin 74 

The Keal 77 

Thalatta 79 

The Blue-Bird of November 81 

Life's Moonrise 84 

Victor 85 

The Violet Star 86 

Prairie Children 87 

Childhood 89 

The Tobacco-Stemmers 89 

The Rhymes of Ironquill 92 

Adieu 93 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE 



THE TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 
AND SCHOOL READINGS 



This series of Classics and School Readings has been 
designed to furnish to the public schools supplementary 
reading for use in the class-room. While the first year's 
outline of the series as planned will be local in its char- 
acter, it should be here stated that it is not the inten- 
tion to continue exclusively as such. As the series 
develops and the numbers in it increase, the field of 
general literature will be gleaned and selections pre- 
sented from standard authors. It is also the intention, 
as the series develops, to classify the same, so that in 
this series of School Readings selections will be found 
for all grades of school work, from the primary grades 
through the high school. 

No one need regret the fact that in this day the 
terms "Classics" and "School Readings" are, in the 

(7) 



8 INTRODUCTORY NOTE 

educational world, synonymous in meaning. The title 
under which this series is issued is therefore appropri- 
ate. Many of the numbers will appear as classics from 
the masters in our literature, and others under the more 
modest title of "School Readings." 



AN INTRODUCTORY WORD 



Eugene F.Ware, as " Ironqiiill," is recognized through- 
out the West as the Poet Laureate of Kansas. His 
"Rhymes of Ironquill " are known and read with in- 
terest in both England and America. In this local 
series of School Readings to be issued by the publishers 
of "The Twentieth Century Classics and School Read- 
ings/' it is fitting that "Selections from Ironquill" 
should come first. In season and out of season Iron- 
quill has sung of Kansas — ^of the glory of her harvests, 
of the beauty of her ever-rolling prairies, and of the 
sturdy character of her freedom-loving ])ioneers. The 
poems of "Quivera," "The Three States," "John 
Brown," and "Ad Astra Per Aspera," are not merely 
expressions of his pride in Kansas and his loyalty to 
his State, but also of his loyalty to the Nation as well. 
With him State pride means national pride. In "John 
Brown" he not only stirs our hearts with State history, 
but thrills us with a larger national theme and arrests 

our attention with one of the great world -problems of 

(9) 



10 AN INTRODUCTORY WORD 

the future. This poem is worthy of beiDg memorized 
by every boy and girl within the borders of our State. 

But it is not alone of Kansas that this poet has sung. 
His themes have been diverse. In this little volume of 
selections a round of subjects will appear. "The Geese 
and the Cranes," " The Tobacco-Stemmers," " The Vio- 
let Star," "The Now," "Decoration Day at Arlington," 
" The Protest," " The Washerwoman's Song," and " The 
Sunset Marmaton," as well as the many other selections 
which appear in this volume, will appeal to all who read 
them. 

It is believed that the selections herewith brought 
together will be welcomed by the teachers of Kansas, 
it being the first collection of a Kansas author ever 
offered to the schools of the State for the purpose of 
supplementary reading. 

Mr. Ware is a firm and steadfast supporter of the 
public - school system of Kansas, and a true friend to 
the teachers of our State. He believes in the teachers 
and in the possibilities of their great work. Acknowl- 
edgment is due him and thanks are hereby tendered 
him for his great kindness and generosity in permitting 
these school selections to be made from his "Rhymes 
of Ironquill." The Editor. 

Topeka, Kansas, September, 1899. 



BIOGRAPHICAL 



Eugene Fitch Ware was born May 29, 1841, in Hart- 
ford, Conn. When he was a lad his parents removed 
to Burlington, in Iowa Territory. When the Civil War 
broke out he had learned the trade of harness-making, 
and was working at the bench. In April, 1861, he en- 
listed as a private soldier in the First Iowa Volunteer 
Infantry, which was a three-months regiment. He then 
reeniisted, serving successively in the Fourth Iowa Cav- 
alry and the Seventh Iowa Cavalry, and was mustered 
out with the latter regiment in June, 1866, having 
served through the entire war and for more than a 
year afterwards. 

During the latter part of his service as lieutenant 
and captain he was aide-de-camp successively for Gen- 
erals Robert B. Mitchell, C. J. Stolbrand, Washington 
R. Elliott, and Grenville M. Dodge, the latter having 
been one of General Sherman's corps commanders. 

In 1867 Mr. Ware came to Fort Scott, Kansas, and 
opened a harness and saddlery shop, and also took up 

(11) 



12 BIOGRAPHICAL 

a section of land as a farm in Cherokee county. He 
afterward made a partnership arrangement by which he 
worked the farm in summer and in the shop in winter. 
During this period he studied law, and on June 19, 1871, 
came up from the farm, passed an examination, and 
was admitted to the bar. He then sold his interest in 
the shop, rented the farm, and went as an assistant 
into the law office of McComas & McKeighan, at Fort 
Scott. 

In the summer and fall of 1872 Mr. Ware edited the 
Fort Scott Monitor in the interest of Mr. Greeley for 
President of the United States. 

In February, 1873, he opened a law office for himself 
n\ Fort Scott. 

After his admission to the bar he began contributing 
to the papers under the name of "Ironquill." His first 
poem to attract attention was "Neutralia," which was 
published in chapters in 1871. 

In 1874 a State editorial convention was held in Fort 
Scott, at which he delivered a poetical address, which 
was well received and widely published. It is found in 
his printed volume. 

In October, 1874, he was married, in Rochester, N. Y., 
to Miss Jeanette Huntington, a graduate of Vassar Col- 
lege and granddaughter of Jonas P. Galusha, once Chief 
Justice and afterwards Governor of Vermont. 



BIOGRAPHICAL 1 3 

Mr. Ware was twice elected to the State Senate, once 
for an unexpired term in 1879 and once for a full term 
in 1880, ending in 1884, at which hatter time he was a 
candidate for Congress, but was defeated for the nomi- 
nation. 

Mr. Ware was elected Presidential Elector at large 
for Kansas in 1888. He was appointed as Major-General 
of the Kansas State Militia, and was Commissioner for 
the State to the Yorktown Centennial, and later to the 
Washington Centennial, which was held with great mag- 
nificence in New York city. 

He delivered, on invitation, a Decoration Day poem 
at the Arlington National Cemetery, near Washington, 
before an audience of several thousand people, which 
included the President, his family and Cabinet, and 
many distinguished officers of the army and navy. 

In 1892 Mr. Ware made a tour of Europe with his 
wife. In 1898 he moved his business and family to 
Topeka, of which city he is now a resident; but before 
he left Fort Scott he collected, organized and gave to 
the city a public library, with books and real estate 
valued at ten thousand dollars. He has always been a 
stanch friend of public education and of the public 
schools. 

Mr. Ware translated from the French of Ternaux- 
Compans the account of the discovery of Kansas by 



14 BIOGRAPHICAL 

Coronado as told by Castaneda. This translation, cor- 
rected partly from the Spanish text, was published in 
the "Agora," a Kansas magazine, which was the first 
time the story was ever printed in English. 

Mr. Ware has had three London editions of his poems 
published, besides several American editions. 

He is at present still in the practice of law in Topeka. 



SELECTIONS FROM IRONQUILL 



QUIYEKAi— KANSAS. 

In that half -forgotten era, 
With the avarice of old, 
Seeking cities he was told 
Had been paved with yellow gold, 

In the kingdom of Quivera — 

Came the restless Coronado^ 
To the open Kansas plain, 
With his knights from sunny Spain ; 
In an effort that, though vain. 

Thrilled with boldness and bravado. 

League by league, in aimless marching. 
Knowing scarcely where or why. 
Crossed they uplands drear and dry. 
That an unprotected sky 

Had for centuries been parching. 

But their expectations, eager. 
Found, instead of fruitful lands, 
Shallow streams and shifting sands. 
Where the buffalo in bands 

Roamed o'er deserts dry and meager. 

1 Quivera : See Hazelrigg's "History of Kansas," pages 5-12. 

2 Coronado, the Spanish explorer of Arizona, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Kansas, 
or the ancient kingdom of Quivera, with its seven fabled cities. 

(15) 



16 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

Back to scenes more trite, yet tragic, 

]Vrarched the knights with armor' d steeds ; 
ISTot for them the quiet deeds ; 
Xot for them to sow the seeds 

From which empires grow like magic. 

'Never land so hnnger-stricken 

Could a Latin^ race re-mold; 

They could conquer heat or cold — 

Die for glory or for gold — 
But not make a desert quicken. 

Thus Quivera was forsaken; 
And the world forgot the place 
Through the lapse of time and space. 
Then the blue-eyed Saxon^ race 

Came and bade the desert waken. 

And it bade the climate vary; 
And awaiting no reply 
From the elements on high, 
It with plows besieged the sky — 

Vexed the heavens with the prairie. 

Then the vitreous sky relented, 

And the unacquainted rain 
. Fell upon the thirsty plain. 

Whence had gone the knights of Spain, 
Disappointed, discontented. 

lA term applied to certain races who speak languages principally derived from 
Latin,— especially French, Spanish, and Italian. 

2 A general term for the races of northern Europe, here made to include the Anglo- 
Saxon or English-speaking people. 



SELECTIONS EKOM lEONQUILL 

Sturdy are the Saxon faces, 
As tliey move along in line; 
Bright the rolling-cutters^ shine, 
Charging up the State's incline, 

As an army storms a glacis. 

Into loam the sand is melted, 

And the blue-grass takes the loam, 
Round about the prairie home ; 
And the locomotives roam 

Over landscapes iron-belted. 

Cities grow where stunted birches 
Hugged the shallow water-line; 
And the deepening rivers twine 
Past the factory and mine. 

Orchard slopes and schools and churches. 

Deeper grows the soil and truer, 
More and more the prairie teems 
With a fruitage as of dreams; 
Clearer, deeper, flow the streams, 

Blander grows the sky and bluer. 

We have made the State of Kansas, 
And to-day she stands complete — 
First in freedom, first in wheat ; 
And her future years will meet 

Ripened hopes and richer stanzas. 

A cutter attached to the beam of a prairie breaking-plow. 
—2 



17 



18 



TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 



THE SUNSET MAKMATON.^ 

O Marmaton! O Marmaton! 
From out the rich autumnal west 
There creeps a misty, pearly rest, 

As through an atmosphere of dreams. 
Along thy course, O Marmaton, 
A rich September sunset streams. 
Thy purple sheen, 
Through prairies green, 
Erom out the burning west is seen. 

I watch thy fine, 
' Approaching line, 

That seems to flow like blood-red wine 
Eresh from the vintage of the sun. 
The spokes of steel 
And blue reveal 

The outlines of a phantom wheel. 
While airy armies, one by one, 
March out on dress-parade. 
I see unrolled. 
In blue and gold. 

The guidons where the line is made, 
And, where the lazy zephyrs strolled 
Along tky verdant esplanade,^ 

1 A small though beautiful river, flowing through southeasteru Kansas. Fort Scott, 
a former home of the poet, Is situated within view of this stream. 
'^A clear, level space used for public walks or drives. 



SELECTIONS FROM IKONQUIEL 19 

I see the crested, neighing herd 

Go plunging to the stream. 

I hear the flying, shrieking scream 
Of startled bird. 

The Kansas day is done. 

O Marmaton! O Marmaton! 

Thou hast no stor^^ and no song; 
Unto the vast 
And empty past, 
In which thy former life was cast, 

Thou dost not yet belong. 
jSTo mountain cradle hast thou had ; 

Along thy line 

!N^o summits shine, 
No clifi's, no gorges, stern and sad, 
Stand in the waning twilight, clad 

In melancholy pine. 
Thou art the even-tempered child 
Of prairies, on whose verdant wild 
Eternities have smiled. 

O Marmaton! O Marmaton! 
Be patient, for thy day will come. 
And bring the bugle and the drum. 
Thy fame shall like thy ripples run ; 
Thou shalt be storied j-et. 
Within this great 
And central State, 

The destiny of some proud day 
Upon thy banks is set. 



20 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

Artillery will sweep away 

The orcliard. and the prairie home, 
And while the wheat stacks redly burn, 
Armies of infantry will charge 
The lines of works along thy marge, 
While cavalry brigades will churn 

Thy frightened waters into foam. 
The spell of centuries will break. 
And thou shalt suddenly awake, 
And have a story that will make 
A nation's pulses thrill. 
And when again thy banks are still, 
ISTo new admirer of the time 
Can say of thee in feeble rhyme: 
" O Marmaton ! O Marmaton ! 
Thou hast no story and no song;. 
Thou hast no history of wrong; 
Unto the vast 
And empty past 

In which thy former life was cast, 
Thou dost not yet belong." 

O Marmaton! O Marmaton! 
The centuries will pass along, 

And slowly, singly, one by one. 
Repeat thy story and thy song. 
Thy time abide, 

O Marmaton; 
While side by side, 

O Marmaton, 



SELECTIONS FEOM IRONQUILL 21 

The shadows o'er thj prairies glide, 
Thj prairies wide, 

O Marmaton. 
For nations come and nations go, 
Whither and whence we cannot know. 

Great days, in stormy years though hid. 

Great years, dark centuries amid, 
Will ever and anon emerge, 
Like life-boats drifting through a surge 
Where billows sweep and mad winds urge. 
Of future heed, 

O Marmaton, 

Thou hast no need, 

O Marmaton. 
With quiet force. 
In quiet course. 

Still murmur on, O Marmaton. . , 



TO-DAY. 



Work on, work on — 

Work wears the world away; 
Hope when to-morrow comes, 

But work to-day. 

Work on, work on — 

Work brings its own relief; 
He who most idle is 

Has most of grief. 



22 TWENTIETH OENTUKY CLASSICS 



THE :n"ow. 

The charm of a love is its telling, the telling that goes 
with the giving ; 

The charm of a deed is its doing; the charm of a life is 
its living; 

The soul of the thing is the thought; the charm of the 
act is the actor; 

The soul of the fact is its truth, and the now is its prin- 
cipal factor. 

The world loves the Now^ and the Nowist,^ and tests all 

assumptions with rigor ; 
It looks not behind it to failing, but forward to ardor and 

vigor; 
It cares not for heroes who faltered, for martyrs who 

hushed and recanted, 
For pictures that never were painted, for harvests that 

never were planted. 

The world does not care for a fragrance that never is lost 

in perfuming, 
The world does not care for the blossoms that wither away 

before blooming; 
The world does not care for the chimes remaining unrung 

by the ringer, 
The world does not care for the songs unsung in the soul 

of the singer. 

^ The present time. 

'One who lives In the present time. 



SELECTIONS FROM lEONQUILL 23 

What use to mankind is a purpose that never shone forth 

in a doer ? 
What use has the world for a loving that never had winner 

nor wooer ? 
The motives, the hopes and the schemes that have ended in 

idle conclnsions, 
Are buried along with the failures that come in a life of 

illusions. 

Away with the flimsy idea that life with a past is at- 
tended ; 

There 's l^ow — only l^ow, and no Past — there 's never a 
past: it has ended. 

Away with its obsolete story, and all of its yesterday 
sorrow ; 

There 's only to-day, almost gone, and in front of to-day 
stands to-morrow\ 

And hopes that are quenchless are sent us like loans from 

a generous lender. 
Enriching us all in our efforts, yet making no poorer the 

sender ; 
Lightening all of our labors, and thrilling ns ever and 

ever 
With the ecstasy of success and the raptures of present 

endeavor. 



24 TWENTIETH CENTUKY CLASSICS 



THE KANSAS OCTOBER 

The cheeriness and cliarm 

Of forest and of farm 
Are merging into colors sad and sober; 

The hectic frondage drapes 

The nut trees and the grapes — - 
September yields to opulent October. 



The cottonwoods that frinjre 



The streamlets take the tinge ; 
Through opal haze the sumac^ bush is burning; 

The lazy zephyrs lisp, 

Through cornfields dry and crisp, 
Their fond regrets for days no more returning. 

The farm dog leaves the house 

To fluslr the timid grouse; 
The languid steers on blue-stem lawns are feeding; 

The evening twilight sees 

The rising Pleiades,^ 
While autumn suns are to the south receding. 

To me there comes no thrill 
Of gloominess or chill, 

^ Written also shumac. 

3 To put to flight ; spoken of birds and game. 

» A group of small stars in the neck of the constellation Taurus ; so named from the 
seven daughters of Atlas and the nymph Plelone, fabled to have been turned by Jupiter 
into stars. 



SELECTIONS EEOM lEONQUILL 25 

As leaflets fade from branches elm or oaken, 

As lifelessly they liang, 

To me there comes no pang; 
To me no grief the falling leaves betoken. 

As summer's floral gems 

Bequeath us withered stems, 
And autumn-shattered relics dry and umber; 

So do these lives of ours. 

Like summer leaves and flowers, 
Flourish apace, and in their ripeness slumber. 



THEEE STATES. 

Of all the States, but three will live in story : 
Old Massachusetts with her Plymouth Eock, 
And old Virginia with her noble stock, 
And Sunny Kansas with her woes and glory; 
These three will live in song and oratory. 
While all the others, with their idle claims. 
Will only be remembered as mere names. 



26 TWENTIETH CEXTURT CLASSICS 



THE BIKD SONG. 

In the night air I heard the Avoodland ringing, 
I heard it ring with wild and thrilling song ; - 

Hidden the bird whose strange inspiring singing 
Seems yet to float in liquid waves along, — 



Seems vet to float with many a quirk^ and quaver,^ 
With quirks and quavers and exultant notes, 

As through the air, with sympathetic waver, 

Down through the songs the falling starlight floats 

Speaking, I said: "O bird with songs sonorous, 
O bird with songs of such sonorous glee, 

Sing me a song of joy, and in the chorus. 
In the same chorus I will join with thee. 

" The songs that others sing seem but to sadden, — 

Seem but to sadden, — those which I have heard,- 
Sing me a song whose gleesome notes will gladden — 
Sing me a song of joy.'' Then sang the bird: 



" There is a land where blossoming exotic. 
The amaranths with fadeless colors glow; 
Where notes of birds with melodies chaotic 
In tangled songs forever come and go. 

1 An irregular note. 2 a rapid or tremulous vibration of the voice. 



SELECTIONS FROM IEO]S"QUILL 



27 



" There skies serene and bland will bend above us, 
And from them blessings like the rain will fall; 
There those fond friends that v/e have loved shall love us, 
In that bright land those friends shall love us all." 

The singer ceased, the rhapsodj^^ sonorous 

'No more through starlit woodland sped along; 

And as it ceased, my heart refused the chorus, 
Kef used to join the chorus of the song. 

"Ah, no," I said, " thou bird in branches hidden, 

Hope's garlands bright Grief's fingers slowly twine ; 
Grief slowly twines from blooms that spring unbidden — 
That spring unbidden as our lives decline. 

" Grief present now proves naught of tlie eternal ; 

Grief proves no future with good blessings rife — 
With blessings rife and futures blandly vernal; 
Facts show no logic in a future life." 

And then I said : " False is thy song sonorous — 
Thy song that floats from starlit woodland dim; 

When we are gone and flowers are blooming o'er us — 
When man has gone, there ends the all with him." 

Still sang the bird : " There skies shall bend above us. 
And sprinkle blessings like the rains that fall ; 

And those we loved — who loved us not — shall love us, 
In that bright land shall love us most of all." 

^A musical composition Irregular In form. 



28 l-^VENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

Then came a song-burst of bewildering splendor, 
That rolled in waves through forest corridors; 

Up soared the bird, fain did my hopes attend her, 
And hopes and songs were lost amid the stars. 

jS^ow all day long, upon my mind intruding, 
There comes the echo of that last night's song; 

Grief claims the wreck on which my mind is brooding, 
Hope claims the facts which logic claimed so long. 

Who cares, O bird, for skies that bend above us? 

Who cares if blessings like the rain shall fall, 
If only those who loved us not shall love us — ■ 

In that bright future love us most of all? 

Let logic marshal ranks of facts well stated. 

It leads them on in vain though brave attacks; 

For, looking down from bastions crenelated, 
Hope smiles derision at assaulting facts. 



SHADOW. 

The day has been vague, and the sky has been bleak. 
Affairs have gone backward the whole day long; 
My friends as I meet them will scarcely speak, 
And vainly the things I have lost I seek. 
I am weary and sad — and the world is wrong. 



SELECTIONS FROM lEONQUILL 29 

The morrow has come, and the sky has grown clear, 
The world appears righted, and rings with song; 
My friends as I meet them have words of cheer, 
The things that I thought I had lost reappear. 

And the work pushes forward the whole day long. 

As the strings of a harp, standing side by side, 

Are the days of sadness and days of song; 
The sunshine and sliadow are ever allied. 
But the shadows will fade, and the sunshine bide. 
Though to-day may be dim, and the world go wrong. 



THE WASHERWOMAN'S SOXG. 

In a very humble cot. 

In a rather quiet spot. 

In the suds and in the soap. 
Worked a woman full of hope ; 

Working, singing, all alone, 

In a sort of undertone : 

" With the Savior for a friend, 
He will keep me to the end." 

Sometimes happening along, 

I had heard the semi-song, 
And I often used to smile, 
More in sympathy than guile; 



30 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

But I never said a word 
In regard to what I heard, 
As she sang about her friend 
Who wonhl keep her to the end. 

I^Tot in sorrow nor in glee 
Working all day long was she, 
As her children, three or four, 
Played around her on the floor; 
But in monotones the song 
She was humming all day long: 
'' With the Savior for a friend, 
He will keep me to the end." 

It ^s a song I do not sing, 
For I scarce believe a thing 
Of the stories that are told 
Of the miracles of old ; 
But I know that her belief 
Is the anodyne^ of grief. 

And will always be a friend 
That will keep her to the end. 

Just a trifle lonesome she, 
Just as poor as poor could be; 
But her spirits ahvays rose. 
Like the bubbles in the clothes, 
And, though widowed and alone. 
Cheered her with the monotone. 
Of a Savior and a friend 
Who would keep her to the end. 

1 Anything that soothes disturbed feelings. 



31 



SELECTIONS EEOM IRONQUIEL 

I have seen lier rub and scrub, 
On the washboard in the tub, 
While the baby, sopped in suds. 
Rolled and tumbled in the duds ; 
Or was paddling in the pools. 
With old scissors stuck in spools ; 
She still humming of her friend 
Who would keep her to the end. 

Human hopes and human creeds 
Have their root in human needs ; 
And I should not wish to strip 
From that washerwoman's lip 
Any song that she can sing, 
Any hope that songs can bring ; 
For the woman has a friend 
Who will keep her to the end. 



TYPE. 

All night the sky was draped in darkness thick ; 
From rumbling clouds imprisoned lightnings swept ; 

Into the printer's stick,^ 

With energetic click. 
The ranks of type into battalions crept. 
Which formed brigades while dreaming labor slept ; 
And ere dawn's crimson pennons were unfurled. 
The night-formed columns charged the waking world. 

1 A frame of metal or wood luto which type is placed, lu the work known as "type- 
setting." 



32 TWENTIETH CENTUKY CLASSICS 



THE OLD PIOIsrEER. 

Where are they gone ? Where are they — 

The faces of my chiklhood ? 
I 've sought them by the mountains, 

By the rivers, by the canyons ; 
I have called upon the prairie, 

I have called upon the wildwood: 
" Oh, give me back 1 Oh, give me back 

The faces of my childhood — 
The boys and girls. 

My playmates, my companions ! " 

The days of early childhood 

Have a strange, attractive glimmer, 
A lustrous, misty fadelessness. 

Half seen and yet half hidden, 
As of isles in distant oceans. 

Where the shattered moonbeams shimmer, 
Concealing half, disclosing half, 

W^ith rapturing, fracturing glimmer. 
The realms to which 

Our visits are forbidden. 

'Now vainly am I calling 

On the mountains and the canyons ; 
And vainly from the forest, 

Erom the river or the wildwood, 



SELECTIONS FROM IRONQUILL 33 

Do I ask the restoration 

Of iTij playmates, my companions. 
Xo voice returns from mountain-sides, 

From forest or from canyons ; 
Forever gone, — 

The faces of my childhood. 



wmxEE. 

The sleet 
Will beat, 
And the snow 
Will blow. 
And the rain 
Will drain 
From the plain 

So sadly ; 
And the night come down 
So bleak and brown, 
While the blast 
Shrieks past 
So fast 

And madly. 



34 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 



JOHN BKOWK^ 

States are not great 
Except as men may make them ; 
Men are not great except they do and dare. 
But States, like men, 
Have destinies that take them — 
That bear them on, not knowing why or where. 



The WHY repels 
The philosophic searcher — 
The WHY and where all questionings defy, 
Until we find, 
Far back in youthful nurture, 
Prophetic facts that constitute the why. 

All merit comes 

From braving the unequal ; 

All glory comes from daring to begin. 

Fame loves the State 

That, reckless of the sequel, 

Fights long and well, whether it lose or win. 



iBoPQ In Torrington, Conn., In 1800; was hanged at Charlestown, Ya., Dec. 2, 1859. 
( See chap. 13, History of Kansas, by Noble L. Prentis.) 



SELECTIONS PROM lEONQUIIit 35 

Than in our State 
"No illustration apter 
Is seen or found of faith and hope and will. 
Take up her story : 
Every leaf and chapter 
Contains a record that conveys a thrill. 

And there is one 
Whose faith, whose fight, whose failing, 
Fame shall placard upon the walls of time. 
He dared begin — 
Despite the unavailing, 
He dared begin, when failure was a crime. 

When over Africa 
Some future cycle 
Shall sweep the lake-gemmed uplands with its surge ; 
When, as with trumpet 
Of Archangel Michael,^ 
Culture shall bid a colored race emerge ; 

When busy cities 
There, in constellations. 
Shall gleam with spires and palaces and domes, 
With marts wherein 
Is heard the noise of nations ; 
With sunmier groves surrounding stately homes — 



^ A character In Milton's Paradise Lost, sent with Gabriel to battle with Satan and 
his angels ; and with a band of cherubim to Paradise, to drive out Adam and Eve and 
foretell to them future events till the time of Christ. 



36 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

There, future orators 
To cultured freemen 
Shall tell of valor, and recount with praise 
Stories of Kansas, 
And of Lacedagmon^ — 
Cradles of freedom, then of ancient days. 

From boulevards^ 
O'erlooking both IN'yanzas,^ 
The statured bronze shall glitter in the sun. 
With rugged lettering: 

" John Brown of Kansas : 
ITe dared begin; 
He lost, 

BlTTj LOSING^ WON." 



EEQUIEM. 

I am rambling with the rivers, 
I am falling with the rain, 

I am waving in the woodland, 
I am growing in the grain. 

I am marching in the zephyr, 
I am rimpling in the rill, 

I am blooming on the prairie — 
But I live in Kansas still. 

1 An ancient Grecian state, of which Sparta was the capital. 

''A broad uveuue. 8 Albert and Victoria Nyanza, two noted lakes of Africa. 



SELECTIONS FROM IKONQUILL 37 



THE PKOTEST. 

[Written while the Government ivas removing 
hurled soldiers from the battle-fields of secession 
and organizing national cemeteries.'] 

Let them rest, let tlicm rest where they fell. 
Every battle-field is sacred; 
If you let them stay to guard it, 
They will veil those spots with valor 

Like a spell. 
All the soil Avill seem imi)lanted 
With the germs of vital freedom ; 
Where they spent their lives so grandly 

Let them dwell ; 
Do not rank them up in fields, 
Under pallid marble shields ; 
Let them rest and be cherished 
Where they fell. 

Let them rest, let them rest where they fell : 
On the prairie, in the forest. 
Under cypress, under laurel, 
On the mountain, by the bayou,^ 
In the dell. 

lAn Inlet of a lake or river; so called In the Southern States. 



38 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

Let the glories of the battle 
Shroud the heroes who are buried, 
Eesting where thej fought so bravely, 

Long, and well. 
Do not rank them up in fields, 
Under pallid marble shields ; 
Let them rest, let them rest 

Where they fell. 



HEAETS. 

As long as the meadows may bloom, and as long as the 

brooks may run. 
The brain will forever be winning, as brains have forever 

won, 
Commanding the battle of life till the battle of life is 

done. 

'No, no, the idea is error; the brain never wins the fight; 
Its contests are seldom decided, its reasonings rarely right ; 
The multitude watches its failures and ridicules with de- 
light. 

But, long as the grass may be growing, and long as the 

waters run, 
The heart will forever be winning, as hearts have forever 

won. 
Commanding the battle of life till the battle of life is done. 



SELECTIONS FROM lEONQUILL ,. , 39 



DECOKATIOlSr DAY. 

\_Recited at Arlington}^ 

It is needless I should tell you 

Of the history of Sumter,^ 
How the chorus of the cannon shook its walls ; 

How the scattered navies gathered, 

How the iron-ranked battalions 
Rose responsive to the country's urgent calls. 

It is needless that I tell you, 

For the time is still too recent, 
How was heard the first vindictive cannon's peal ; 

How two brothers stopped debating 

On the sad, unsettled question, 
And referred it to the arbitrating steel.^ 

It is needless that I tell you 

Of the somber davs that followed — 



'A national cemetery at Washington, D. C, on the Virginia side of the Potomac 
river. 

2 A fort near Charleston, South Carolina, fired upon April 12-13, 1861. This -was the 
opening act of the Civil War. 

• Sword, as an equivalent for any firearms. 



40 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

Stormy days that in such slow succession ran ; 
Of Antietam/ Chickamauga,^ 
Gettysburg,^ and Murfreesboro,* 

Or the rocky, cannon-shaken Eapidan.^ 

It Avas not a war of conquest : 

It was fought to save the Union, 
It Avas waged for an idea of the right ; 

And the graves so widely scattered 

Show how fruitful an idea 
In peace, or war, may be in moral might. 

Brief indeed the Avar had lasted, 
Had it raged in hope of plunder ; 

Briefer still, had glory been its only aim. 
But its long and sad duration 
And the graves it has bequeathed us, 

Other motives, other principles proclaim. 

I^eed I mention this idea. 

The invincible idea. 
That so seemed to hold and save the nation's life; 

That, resistless and unblenching, 

Undisheartened by disaster, 
Seemed the soul and inspiration of the strife ? 

1 A river in Maryland, the scene of a terrific battle fought Sept, 17, 1862. 
loco^ ^^^^"^ "®^'* Chattanooga, Tenn., the scene of a battle of the Civil War, Sept. 19-20, 

^ A town in southern Pennsylvania, the most northerly point at which a battle was 
fought during the Civil War, July 1-3, 1863. 

* A town in Tennessee at which a battle was fought Dec. 31, 1862. 
'A river In Virginia. 



SELECTIONS FROM IRONQUILE 41 

This idea was of freedom^ 

Was that men should all stand equal, 
That the world was interested in the fight ; 

That the present and the future 

Were electors who had chosen 
Us to argue and decide the case aright. 

And the theories of freedom 

Those now silent bugles uttered 
Will reverberate with ever-growing tones; 

Tliej^ can never be forgotten, 

But will work among the nations 
Till they sweep the world of shackles and of thrones. 

It is meet that we do honor 

To the comrades who have fallen — 

Meet that we the sadly woven garlands twine. 
Where they buried lie is sacred, 
Whether 'neath the Northern marble 

Or beneath the Southern cypress-tree or pine. 

I^ations are the same as children — 

Always living in the future. 
Living in their aspirations and their hopes ; 

Picturing some future greatness. 

Reaching forth for future prizes. 
With a wish for higher aims and grander scopes 

It is better for the people 
That they reach for an ideal. 



42 



TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

That they give their future nations better lives ; 
Though the standard be unreal, 
Though the hope meets no fulfillment, 

Though the fact in em^^tj dreams alone survives. 

If the people rest contented 

With the good they have accomplished, 
Then they retrograde and slowly sink away. 

Give a nation an ideal, 

Some grand, noble, central project; 
It, like adamant, refuses to decay. 

'Tis the duty of the poet, 

'Tis the duty of the statesman, 
To inspire a nation's life with nobler aims ; 

And dishonor will o'ershadow 

Him who dares not, or who falsely 
His immortal-fruited mission misproclaims. 



DEWEY.i 

O Dewey was the morning 

Upon the first of May ; 
And Dewey was the Admiral 

Down in Manila bay ; 
And Dewey were the Kegent's eyes, 

" Them orbs " of Eoyal Blue; 
And Dewey feel discouraged ? 

I Dew not think we Dew. 

^Thls little stanza of humorous and punninj? rhyme was written by "Ironquill" Im- 
mediately after the receipt of the news of Admiral Dewey's victory at Manila, and was 
widely copied by the press of the country. 



SELECTIONS mOM rRONQOTLI. 



43 



rKAUDS. 

Ambitious, shrewd, 
Unprincipled, and ever fond of show, 
Hanno,^ of Carthage, centuries ago, 

Determined to be great ; he bought a brood 
Of fledgling parrots, taught them at his nod 
To scream in chorus, " Hanno is a god ! " 

When they were taught. 
He had a hireling place them on the street, 
As if for sale to those he chanced to meet ; 

But yet by no one could the birds be bought. 
Then Hanno passed in pomp, and gave a nod. 
Out shrieked the parrots : " Hanno is a god ! " 

^^ Cunningly done." 
That night said Hanno, as he doffed his clothes 
Of silk embroidery, to seek repose : 

" Distinguished immortality is won ; 
For heardst thou not that superstitious squad 
Catch up the sentence: ' Hanno is a god ' ? " 

A galley slave. 
Condemned, went Hanno o'er the cloudy seas 
That hid the fabled Cassiterides f 

Wealthy in grief, no home except the wave, 
Lashed to the oar, betimes urged by the rod, 
Not very much a man, much less a god. 

1 Hannibal, a hero of Carthage ; died 183 B. 0. , , 

2 Fabled Islands northwest of Spain- perhaps the modern SciUy Isle«. 



44 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

It could not win. 
It never did. Although the world applauds, 
It turns at last and punishes its frauds. 

Although it may not hasten to begin ; 
True to itself, when once it has begun. 
It drives them to the galleys one by one. 



GLORY. 

A rocket scaled the terraces of night. 
And yet 
It failed to reach the parapet.^ 

i told a noble-hearted fri?nd of mine 
That he, 
Though great, far greater yet would be. 

He rose as did Acestes'^ arrow rise ; 
He burned. 
And burning, into ashes turned. 

He rose, and rising blazed, and burned away, 
And yet 
He failed to reach the parapet. 

^ The summit. 

2 A story Is told by Virgil which relates that Acestes in a contest tied some flax to his 
arrow and lighted It and shot it so high In the air that it all burned up. 



SELECTIONS FKOM IRONQUILL 



45 



THE GEESE AND THE CEA^^ES. 

It is sunrise. In the morn 
Stands a field of ripened corn; 
And tlie ricli antmnnal rays 
Of those sunny Kansas days 
Fill that field of ripened corn 
With an opalescent haze^ 
Elocks of geese and flocks of cranes 
Pick the fallen, golden. grains. 

It is noon-time ; and the rays 
Of the Indjan summer blaze ; 
Then the field of ripened corn, 
Much more shattered than at morn. 
Seems emerging from the haze. 
Fewer geese, but far more cranes. 
Pick the fallen, golden grains. 

It is evening; and the haze 
Of the short autumnal days, 
Like a mantle, seems to rest 
On the dark and leaden west. 
Shattered is the field of maize. 

Homeward fly the geese; the cranes 
Linger, picking golden grains. 



46 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS , 

It is midnight. Eains and sleet 
On the blackened landscape beat ; 

And there nothing now remains 
Of that field of standing corn. 

But through darkness, sleet, and rains 

Comes the crying of the cranes, 
As they search the field forlorn, 

Fighting for the final grains. 

Hours the grains, and life the field 
Where the golden grains are had ; 
Daily habits, good and bad. 
Represent the geese and cranes 
Eating up the golden grains. 
Few the habits that are best, 
And they early go to rest ; 
But through sleet and midnight rains 
Heard the cryings are of cranes 
Fighting for the final grains. 



millio:n's. 

Millions of bad men has the world called good. 

Millions of good the world called black and bad ; 
Millions of cowards, strangely understood. 
Have passed for heroes when they never should ; 
Millions of heroes never praise have had ; 
And cravens will the name of honor rob 
Until the pulse of time shall cease to throb. 



SELECTIONS PKOM IRONQUILL 



FAILURE. 

An old man sat npon the porch at evening; 

Down in the west the clouds were banked and sullen. 

'No one was near him, and in withered tone 

The old man spoke unto himself alone : 

"Mj life has been a vanity and failure ; 
My wife, my health, my fortune taken from me ; 
While strange disaster, striking far and wide, 
Has scattered all my children from my side. 

"And here I am alone, without a dollar. 

The hopes of youth all shattered and abandoned ; 

My life a failure — failure from the first, 

A vanity, a failure, of the worst." 

Adown the west he looked with gloomy sorrow ; 
And as he spoke the sky grew more tenebral.^ 
From time to time the cloud-banks lit with flame, 
And fitful zephyrs came, and died, and came. 

Upon his staff his hands were clasped and trembling. 
Upon his hands his brow in sorrow rested ; 
And the sad west seemed constantly to take 
A tinge more dark and dismally opaque. 

^ Dark ; threateuing. 



4:8 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

Then all at once there seemed to stand beside him 
A being draped as if with phosphorescence — 
A form of beauty, that might aptly seem 
To be the emanation^ of a dream. 

So beautiful and good she seemed, a mortal 
!N'eed but behold her once to idolize her ; 
While character and sympathy and grace 
Shone like an inspiration in her face. 

She placed her hand upon the old man's shoulder, 
And spoke in words of magic tone and feeling : 
" Why thus, my father, do you sadly brood 
O'er withered hopes with which all life is strewed ? 

" Your life, though toilsome, has not been a failure. 

Old age may find you left w^ithout a dollar ; 

But earth has blossomed where your hands have 

wrought. 
The world grown wiser where your lips have taught. 

^^ Those coming first build up for those who follow, 
Shaping the future though they know not of it ; 
As on the slow-wrought ledges coraline^ 
The continents of future times begin. 

" Though in old age without a friend or dollar, 
He who has spent his days in honest labor 
Can say with certainty, when they are done. 
His life has been a most successful one. 

* That which flows or proceeds from any object or source. 

2 Composed of coral, a form of limestone deposited by the coral Insect. 



SELECTIONS EKOM lEONQUILL 49 



^' There is no place, except on earth, for dollars — 
Your scattered children will be reunited." 
And then she stooped and kissed the old man's cheek, 
And said, " My father " ; but he did not speak. 

The vision vanished, but the old man moved not ; 
The grief was over, and the failure ended ; 
While on the lifeless face, serene and fixed. 
There seemed a smile as if of peace unmixed. 

Down in the west the banks of cloud tenebral 
Lifted and scattered in the viewless ether ; 
And in their stead, with mild and gentle light, 
Shone forth again the jewels of the night. 



ELUSIOK 

The prairie grasses wdiispered in my ear 

From year to year. 
Strange melodies whose burning verses stole 

Into my soul. 
Strange songs which ever and anon would come 
And sing themselves to me and hum and hum 

Beyond control. 



Yet when I tried to capture, word for word, 
The songs I heard. 

The written verses lost, it seemed to me, 
The pictured melody. 

T had not said that which I tried to say — 

The music had in some uncertain way 
Eluded me. . 



-4 



50 TWENTIETH CENTUKY CLASSICS 



THE SEKE^^ADE. 

Through waning light 
The angel of the night, 

With silver sickle, reaped the western stars ; 
Across my sleep, 
Dreamless as well as deep. 

There came a ballad, whose remembered bars 
Brought back to me a day 
That long had passed away. 

An old, old song, 

Although forgotten long, 
Brings childhood back as songs alone can bring. 

We see bright eyes. 

Behold unclouded skies ; 
We re-inhale the fragrance of life's spring ; 

While, as of unseen bird. 

Rustle of wing is heard. 

Shall our last sleep 

Eternal stillness keep ? 
Shall pulseless dust enclose a dreamless soul ? 

Or shall we hear 

Those songs so old and dear. 
As mid tempestuous melodies there roll 

Upon our sleeping ears 

The choruses of spheres ? 



SELECTIONS FEOM IKONQUILL 51 

ioli:n^e.i 

(The poet's muse.) 

One black evening in October 

All the world seemed sad and sober, 

And a doom 

Dark and dismal 
Shrouded all life's colors prismal, 
And before me yawned abysmal 

Gulfs of gloom. 

Said I, bitterly : I only 

Of the world am sad and lonely, 

I alone 

Drain the chalice ; 
All the angels bear me malice, 
There is love in cot and palace — 

JSTone my own. 

That dark night I turned a traitor 
To myself and my Creator, 

And I said : 

Be it ended, 
Hope may make existence splendid, 
But without it, unattended — 

Better dead. 

1 lo was one of the mythical beauties of Greek mythology. The uame '' loUue" Is 
au luventlon of the poet. 



52 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

Then a something seemed to chide me 
From the darkness there beside me, 

In a tone 

Uttered clearly : 
" You have sj^oken insincerely ; 
There are those who love you dearly, 

Though unknown.'' 

Who are you, and whence your visit ? 
Turning gruffly, said I : Is it 

The unseen 

To awaken ? 
Said the voice : " You 're mistaken ; 
It is loline — forsaken 

loline." 

When I heard the sentence uttered, 
Pn bewilderment I stuttered 

A remark 

Somewhat grimly, 
As a forn'^ freshly, primly. 
Grew and ripened in the dimly 

Lighted dark. 

Yes, the artless little comer. 
Like a musk-rose in the summer 

Seemed to bloom ; 

And her forehead 
Shook back tresses that seemed borrowed 
From the winter night, or quarried 

Out of gloom. 



SELECTIONS FROM IRONQUILL 53 

With a smile so arch and airj, 
To mj side came the fairy, 

Like a queen 

Blitlie and bloomy. 
" Let us stroll/' said she to me ; 
Yes, said I, for I'm gloomy, 

loline. 

Ah ! she told me gorgeous stories 
Of her home, and the glories 

Of the zone 

Where it stretches. 
And she hummed me little sketches 
Of immortal music, such as 

Sweeps the throne. 

All my gloominess was banished; 

Then the moon rose, and she vanished— 

Yes, my queen 

Had departed ; 
But she kissed me ere she started. 
And she left me sunny-hearted 

And serene. 

To that land of sun and blossom 
She has built a bridge of -gossamer 

And gold ; 

And I Ve traveled 
It in dreaming, and unraveled 
Dismal doubts, whereon I caviled 

Days of old. 



54 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

]^ow no evening of October 
Finds me ever sad or sober ; 

All the world 

Seems a palace ; 
There are none who bear me malice, 
And afar away the chalice 

I have hurled. 



THE CHILD OF FATE. 

I am the child of fate. 

What need it matter me 

Where I shall buried be ! 
Death cometh soon or late, 

Whether on land or sea ; 

What may it matter me ! 

Of what hope hangs upon 
We can no insight get ; 

Blindly fate leads us on, 
Storming life's parapet. 

That which our course impels, 

iN'aught of the future tells. 

Whether upon the land. 
Whether upon the strand, 
What may it matter me 
Where I shall buried be ! 
Death cometh soon or late. 
All are the sport of fate. 



SELECTIONS FROM IRONQUIL"L 

What should it matter me, 
Falling as others fell, 
Shattered by shot or shell; 

Either on land or sea, 

Wrecked on the foaming bar, 
Crushed in the shattered car. 

Whether by Arctic cliffs. 

Where the ice-current drifts, 

Where the bleak night-wind sobs. 
Where the black ice-tide throbs ; 

W^hat though my bark may be 

Sunk in some sullen sea ! 

Each has his work and w-ay, 
Each has his part and play, 

Each has his task to do, 
• Both of the good and true. 
Though thou art grave or gay, 
Be thou yet brave and true. 

Work for the right and just, 

W^ith an intrepid^ trust; 
Then it need matter thee 
l^aught, if thou buried be 

Either on land or strand, 
Either 'neath soil or sea. 

1 Fearless. 



55 



56 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 



THE KAl^SAS DUG-OUT. 

Peering from a Kansas hillside, far away, 
Is a cabin made of sod, and bnilt to stay ; 

Through the window-like embrasure 

Pours the mingled gold and azure 
Of the morning of a gorgeous Kansas day. 

Blue-eyed children round the cabin chase the day ; 
They are learning life's best lesson — how to stay, 

To be tireless and resistf ul ; 

And the antelope look wistful, 
And they want to join the children in their play. 

Portune-wrecked, the parents sought the open West, 
Leaving happy homes and friends they loved the best ; 

Homes in cities bright and busy 

That responded to the dizzy, 
To the whirling and tumultuous unrest. 

Oft it happens unto families and men 

That they need must touch their mother earth again ; 

Rising, rugged and reliant, 

Like Antseus,^ the old giant. 
Then they dare and do great things — and not till then. 

1 The giant son of Neptune and the Earth, who lived In a cave in Lybla. He forced 
every stranger who arrived to fight with him. Whenever he was thrown to the earth 
his strength was restored by his mother. By this means he succeeded in killing his 
antagonists. Hercules, perceiving the source of his strength, grasped him by the arms 
and stifled him aloft in the air. 



SELECTIONS EKOM IliONQUILL 57 

As around his neck the arms of children twine. 



Says the father: " Courage, children, never pine; 
Though the skies around you blacken, 
Do not yield — the gales will slacken, 

Faith and fortitude will win, O children mine." 



HISTORY. 

Ovef the infinite prairie of level eternity, 

Flying as flies the deer, 
Time is pursued by a pitiless, cruel oblivion. 
Following fast and near. 

Ever and ever the famishing coyote is following 

Patiently in the rear ; 
Trifling the interval, yet we are calling it " History "- 

Distance from w^olf to deer. 



58 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 



THE PKAIEIE STOEM. 

With the daylight came the storm ; 
And the clouds, like ragged veils, 
Trailed the prairie until noontide, 

Borne bv vacillating gales ; 
And the red elms by the streamlets 
Dripped upon the wild-plum thickets, 
And the thickets, on the crickets 
And the quails. 

Wet and sodden 
Lay the prairie grass untrodden. 

Through the dismal afternoon 

Held the banks of cloud aloof, 
As the smoke in frontier cabins 
Hugs the rafters in the roof. 
Broke the clouds and ceased the dripping. 
And the red elms by the streamlets 
Caught the fading evening beamlets 
That, in proof. 

Gave the token 
That the summer storm was broken. 

With a nimbus like a saint* 

Rose the white moon in the east ; 

And the grass all rose together 
As the guests do at a feast ; 



SELECTIONS FROM IRONQUILL 59 

And the prairie lark kept singing 
All the night long, and the stirring 
And the whizzing and the whirring 

Still increased ; 

Till all sorrow 

Yielded to the brilliant morrow. 



WHITHER. 

Beside a pool where curved a Kansas brook, 
A youthful fisherman stood, brown and tan ; 

A lump of 'lead held down a baited hook, 
And as I watched the eager little man, 
From thought to thought some strange suggestions 
ran. 

Perhaps the soul, as if imprisoned here. 
Is weighted down with lump of heavy- clay, 

Beneath the ocean of the atmosphere ; 

Fain would it rise, and yet perforce must stay 
Deep in the night, yet which we think the day. 

At certain times a power seems to draw. 
And then we feel as if we rose, and light 

Appears to us ; and then some unknowm law 
Is felt to pull us backward in our flight, 
And hold us to the bottom of the night. 



60 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 



THE PALINDROME.i 

Sat a graj and thoughtful soklier 

By his summer Kansas home; 
Came and spoke his freckled nephew, 
" Uncle, what 's a palindrome ? " 

Smoked the soldier then in silence, 

AVistfully he looked afar. 
Then at last he spoke and answered : 
^'Baw was I ere I saw waR^ 

Spoke the nephew : " War and armies 
Threaten not our Kansas home ; 

Do not fight those battles over — 
Tell me, what 's a palindrome." 

Slow replied the grizzled^ soldier, 
'^Raw was I ere I saw waR.'^ 
Read it backward, read it forward, 
That is what the words are for. 

" Life's a palindrome, my nephew — 
You may run it either way; 
Life, from either age or childhood, 

Comes and goes from clay to clay.'' 

* A word, verse, or sentence that Is the same when read backward or forward, 
« Gray haired and bearded. 



SELECTIONS FROM IKONQUILL 61 

It is but a funny riddle 

Witli a simple thread of truth ; 
We can read it up from childhood, 

Then can read it back to youth. 

Honest acts and honest thinking 

Pin your future faith upon ; 
Working with your best endeavor, 
Let 
^'No evil deed live oN.'' 



THE OLD KANSAS VETERAN. 

An aged soldier, with his hair snow white, 
Sat looking at the night. 

A bus}^, shining angel came with things 
Like chevrons on his wings. 

He said, " The evening detail has been made — 
Report to your brigade." 

The soldier heard the message that was sent, 
Then rose and died and went. 



TWENTIETH CENTUIiY CLASSICS 



AD ASTKA PER ASPERA. 

A motto appears 

On the seal of a State — 

Of a State that was born 

While the terror was brewing; 
A motto defying 
The edicts of fate; 

A motto of daring, 

A legend of doing. 

A perilous past 

And a cavernous gloom 
Had enshrouded the State 
In its humble beginning ; 

But courage of soul, 

In repelling the doom. 
Of failure made hope. 
And of losing made winning. 

Through scars to the stars. 
Through the pall of the past. 

Through the gloom to the gleam 

Rose the State from the peril; 
Then gleam became gloom, 
And the laurels at last 

Were scattered in ashes 

Repugnant and sterile. 



SELECTIONS FROM IRONQUtLL 

But Kansas shall shine 
In the stories and songs 

That are told and are sung 
Of undaunted reliance. 
The gloom yet will gleam, 
And the evils and wrongs 
AVill shrivel and crisp 
In the blaze of defiance. 

The future shall bury 

The now — as the woe 
On the field of a battle 
By verdure is hidden; 

And hope will return 

Like the harvests that grow 
Where cannon have plowed 
And the cavalry ridden. 



THE ORGAN -GRINDER. 

I 'm ignorant of music, but still, in spite of that, 
I always drop a quarter in an organ-grinder's hat. 
I welcome on the pavement that old, familiar noise. 
Around which gaily gather all the little girls and boys; 
While solemn, sad and hungry stands, a-turning at the 

crank, 
A nobleman from Europe, of attenuated rank. 



64 TWENTIETH CENTUKY CLASSICS 

Tlie nobleman looks sad, but gives with organistic glee, 
A ballad^ of old Ireland, the jewel of the sea — 
^^ The most distracted country that we have ever seen ; 
They 're hangin' men and women there for wearin' of the 

green — 
For wearin' of the green, for wearin' of the green ; 
They 're hangin' men and Avomen there for wearin' of the 

green." 

And then I think of those who went a-marching off with me^ 
Who claimed a home in Ireland, the jewel of the sea ; 
My comrades and my messmates, none braver or more true ; 
Holding aloft the stars and stripes, a-wearing of the blue. 
Alas ! far down in Dixie their many graves are seen ; 
Beneath the grassy hillocks they are wearing of the green. 

Immortal little island! No other land or clime 

Has placed more deathless heroes in the Pantheon of time. 

Anon the noble Roman brings his music to a halt ; 
There seems an indication of a neighboring revolt. 
He takes a change of venue of about a dozen feet, 
And enfilades the windows that are fronting on the street. 
Around him whirl the girls and boys, with animated glee. 
Once more he grinds ; I recognize " Der Deutscher Com- 

panie." 
" Der Deutscher companie ish der beshtest companiu " — 
The music bears me backward to the year of 'G3. 

^ A short poem, usually sung. 



selectio:n^s feom ironquill 65 

I saw a German regiment step ont from onr brigade; 
It marched across a meadow where a hundred cannon 

played ; 
Its bugles hurled defiance as it skirmished up a slope 
Amid a fire that gave no man the promise of a hope. 

They fell like wheat; they came not back; at night no 

bugles played — 
There was no German regiment attached to our brigade. 

The world has seen thy valor, O land of song and vine! 
Since Hermann^ plucked the eagles from the ramparts of 

the Rhine. 
Down valor's lustrous colonnade is seen the marble 

throng — 
Thy warriors and thy scholars, O land of vine and song. 

About this time the nobleman is asked to take a rest; 
The fires of indignation light his Romulistic^ breast. 
He stops the crank; he gazes up defiantly, yet mute, 
While from the second story there proceeds an ancient 
boot. 

With steady gaze he watches it, and, like a man of nerve, 
lie accurately calculates its hyperbolic^ curve. 
He dodges it ; he marches on ; but soon this man of Rome 
Begins again to turn the crank, — " Johnny comes march- 
ing home." 

1 A German hero ; born 16 B. 0., died 21 A. D. 

-llmnulus, the founder of Rome. 

^Pertaining to the hyperbole, one of the curves of conic sections. 

— 5 



66 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

"When Jolinny comes marcliing home again, hurrah! 

hurrah ! — 

The women will sing, the men will shout, 
The boYS and girls will all turn out; 

We '11 all be gay when Johnny comes inarching 
home/' 

And then I think of those again who went with me to 

war — 
They knew where they were going, and what they went 

there for; 
They felt that there was little left of present or of past, 
Of hope, of home, of future, if the die were wrongly cast. 
Fires smouldered at the firesides when the ISTation called, 

" To arms ! '' 
My comrades left the forests, the founderies, the farms; 
They fought the J^ation's battles, on the land and on the 

sea — 
Alas! alas! no millionaire to war went off with me. 
The merit of the country marched, and filled the Union 

ranks — 
The money of the country marched, and filled the English 

banks. 
At last, when all was over, and Johnny ceased to roam — 
He came with bugles playing; the specie sneaked back 

home. 

O outcast organ-grinder, thy simple ballads start 
The frenzy of the cyclone through the highlands of my 
heart. 



SELECTIONS EEOM lEONQUILL 67 

Some sneer thj ragged music, because to them there comes 
^o bawling of the bugles, no raving of the drums. 
They hear no '^ boots and saddles " sounding in the mid- 
night chill; 
They hear no angry cannon thunder up the rocky hill ; 
They hear no canteens rattle; thej^ see no muskets shine, 
A% ranks sweep by in double-quick to brace the skirmish 
line. 

Go play thy simple music, O friendless sport of fate. 
The ballads of the people are the bulwarks of the State. 
The bugles that hang dreaming now, like bats upon the 

wall. 
Remember well those choruses which rose above the call; 
And in unconscious musings, those battered bugles see 
The glories of the future in the centuries to be. 



SAMPSOK^ 

Alphonso had a fleet 

Which he thought we couldn't beat; 

But Sampson met Cervera, 

And Cervera met defeat. 
Then Blanco he turned blank 
As the Spanish navy sank; 

And the ashes of Columbus 

Fell a trophy to the Yank. 

1 Written by the poet after reading the news of the aluklng of the Spanish fleet by 
Admiral Sampson oS the coast of Santiago de Cuba. 



68 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 



THERE IS SOMETHING IN A FLAG. 

(Taken from "Neutralia.") 

There is something in a flag, and a little burnished eagfe, 
That is more than emblematic — it is glorious, it 's regal. 
You may never live to feel it, you may never be in danger, 
You may never visit foreign lands, and play the roW of 

stranger ; 
You may never in the army check the march of an invader. 
You may never on the ocean cheer the swarthy can- 
non ader; 
But if these should happen to you, then, when age is on 

you pressing. 
And your great big, booby boy comes to ask your final 

blessing, 
You will tell him: Son of mine, be your station proud 

or frugal. 
When your country calls her children, and you hear the 

blare of bugle. 
Don't you stop to think of Kansas, or the quota of your 

county, 
Don't you go to asking questions, don't you stop for pay 

or bounty, 
But you volunteer at once ; and you go where orders take 

you. 
And obey them to the letter if they make you or they 

break you; 

1 The part of an actor in a play. 



SELECTIONS FKOM IRONQUILL 69 

Hunt that flag, and then stay with it, be you wealthy 

or plebeian; 
Let the women sing the dirges, scrape the lint and chant 

the p?pan. 
Though the magazines and journals teem with anti-war 

persuasion, 
And the stay-at-homes and cowards gladly take the like 

occasion, 
Don't you CA^'er dream of asking, " Is the war a right or 

Avrong one ? " 
You are in it, and your duty is to make the fight a strong 

one. 
And you stay till it is over, be the war a short or long 

one; 
^Make amends when Avar is over, then the power with you 

is lying. 
Then, if wrong, do ample justice — but that flag, you keep 

it flying; 
If that flag goes down to ruin, time will then, Avithout 

a Avarning, 
Turn the dial back to midnight, and the Avorld must Avail 

till morning. 



70 TWENTIETH CENTUEY CLASSICS 



THE TELEGRAPH WIRE. 

West from the boiling Missouri, turbid with pulverized 
granite, 

West o'er the orchards and farms asleep in the hammock 
of autumn, 

West o'er the upland uprising, russet with wheatlaud 
close shaven, 

West o'er the yellowish shales and scattering prairie- 
dog cities. 

Why in the moonlight, O wire, so sadly, so constantly 

moaning ? 
Brightly in Argentine's^ smelters murmurous crucibles 

bubble ; 
Proudly uprears in Topeka^ the bronze of the dome and 

the tholus;^ 
Gaily Pueblo* appears with rolling-mills crowning the 



" Come, O my brother, come back ; our mother is grieving 

and dying." 
" Come, O my lover, come back, and I, if you come, will 

forgive you." 

1 A town of eastern Kansas, located near Kansas City, noted for its smelter works. 

2 Capital of Kansas. 

3 A lantern ; the lantern-shaped top or peak of a dome. 
* An industrious town of Colorado. 

6 A name given to the high table-lands of the Rocky Mountain region. 



SELECTIONS FROM lEONQUILL 



71 



" Come, O my daughter, come back ; I wait, and must 

live till I see you." 
" Come, O my husband, come back ; the past, if you come, 

is forgotten." 

Moan on, O wire; you are bearing burdens of hearts 
that are breaking; 

Kindly the zephyrs of Kansas absorb your seolian sor- 
row. 

Listening, listening long, the prairie dog goes to his 
burrow. 

Telling the owl and the snake the woes of the gods and 
their sadness. 



THE BLIZZAKD. 

The fiddler was improvising; at times lie would cease to 
play. 

Then shutting his eyes he sang and sang in a w41d, 
ecstatic way ; 

Then ceasing his song he whipped and whipped the 
strings with his frantic bow. 

Releasing impatient music alternately loud and low; 

Then writhing and reeling he sang as if he were dream- 
ing aloud. 

And wrapping the frenzied music around him like a 
shroud ; 

And this was the strange refrain, which he sang in a 
minor key, 

" 'No matter how^ long the river, the river will reach the 



72 TAVENTIETII CENTUKY CLASSICS 

It was midnight on the Cimarron/ not many a year ago, 
The blizzard was Avhirling pebbles and sand, and billows 

of frozen snow; 
He sat on a bale of harness, in a dug-out roofed with 

clay, 
The wolves overhead bewailed, in a dismal, protracted 

way. 
They peeped down the 'dobe^ chimney, and quarreled, 

and sniffed and clawed; 
But the fiddler kept on with his music, as the blizzard 

stalked abroad. 
And time and again that strange refrain came forth in 

a minor key, 
" "No matter how long the river, the river will reach the 



Around him, on boxes and barrels, uncharmed by the 

fiddler's rune,^ 
The herders were drinking, and betting their cartridges 

on vantoon;* 
And once in a while a player, in spirit of reckless fun. 
Would join in the fiddler's music, and fire off the fiddler's 

gun. 
An old man sat on a sack of corn, and stared with a vacant 

gaze; 
He had lost his hopes in the Gypsum Hills,^ and he thought 

of the olden days. 



^ A river of southwestern Kansas, 
*Adobe, made of unburned, sun-dried brick. 
3 Song. 

^From the French " Vingt-et-un," meaning " twenty-one," a gambling-game com- 
mon on the frontier. 

6 Located in Barber county, Kansas. 



SELECTIONS FROM IRONQUILL T3 

The tears fell fast when the strange refrain came forth 

in a minor key, 
" ^o matter how long the river, the river will reach the 



At morning the tempest ended, and the sun came back 

once more: 
The old, old man of the Gypsum Hills had gone to the 

smoky shore. 
They chopped him a grave, in the frozen ground where 

the morning sunlight fell. 
With a restful look he held in his hand an invisible 

asphodel ; 
They filled up the grave, and each herder said, " Good- 
bye, till the judgment day." 
But the fiddler stayed, and he sang and played as the 

herders walked away, — 
A requiem in a lonesome land, in a mournful minor 

key— 
" 1^0 matter how long the river, the river will reach the 



74 TWENTIETH CENTUEY CLASSICS 



THE OLD CABIN. 

Upon the prairie, as the sun is sinking, 

I see the cabin of a pioneer; 

The clapboard roof is lagging to the rear. 
The walls reject their inartistic chinking. 

The broken porch hangs in unwilling bondage, 
The truant chimney never has returned. 
And in the fire-place, where the embers burned, 

Defiant sunflowers wave their thoughtless frondage. 

The waning sunlight seems to flash and flicker, 
^nd through the empty, open-hearted door. 
And vacant windows, seems to run and pour 

Upon the prairie like a crimson liquor. 

With bloom of June the spongy air is swollen; 

The pompous zephyrs slowly swagger by; 

Then comes a purple tremor in the sky, 
And twilight's silence — nature's semicolon.^ 



Here years ago, when civil war had ended, 
A soldier came, and with him came a bride; 
He once had charged up Lookout Mountain's side, 

And felled proud oaks when liashville was defended. 



1 Nature's semicolon = a slight pause. 



SELECTIONS EROM IRONQUILL 



75 



So when he came to Kansas, strong and fearless, 
Fate had no terrors which he dare not face; 
A soldier in the vanguard of the race, 

He did his share to make his country peerless. 

Here now is ruin; yet, among the brambles, 
A melancholy rose peeps at the sky, 
And shudders at the footsteps, passing by. 

Of vagrant horses on their aimless rambles. 

Upon those pegs, above the chimney mantel, 
A sluggish muzzle-loading musket slept; 
Within the porch, upon that hook, was kept 

An army saddle with a rawhide cantle. 

Among the groves, that by tlie streamlets nestle, 
No more is heard the noise of freighter's camp; 
But in its stead the strange, gigantic tramp 

Of railway trains upon the rumbling trestle. 

No more are deer inquisitivelj^ peering 

Through brown November at the chimney's smoke; 

No more the vicious stroke and counter-stroke 
Of warring buffalo arrest the hearing. 

No more the cyclone, nor the hungry locust, 

Imprint a shadow on the summer sky; 

The drouth has gone — and there have vanished by 
The ills that on the lovers once were focused. 



76 TWEN-TIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

I knew them well — the wife and he now slumber 
Beside the ripples of the Marmaton; 
Both gone away, where years roll on, and on, 

And ever on, and cares no more incnmber. 

" Love lives again," observed the Hebrew rabbin^ — 
" Love lives again in worlds succeeding worlds.'^ 
And so it was. Six boys and four briglit girls 

Bade Hoj)e " Good morning '' in that humble cabin. 

From cabins such as these come sturdy natures. 
Who give proud insj^iration to a state, 
Who fight its battles and decide its fate. 

Who make its courts and shape its legislatures. 

Good-bye, old cabin; time's relentless rigor 
May grind you up at last to shapeless dust; 
But faithfully have you performed your trust. 

And sheltered manly worth and moral vigor. 

1 A Jewish title of respect or honor for a teacher. 



SELECTIONS FROM IRONQUILL 



77 



• THE EEAL. 

They say 
A certain flower that blooms forever 

In sunnier skies, 
Is called the amaranth. They say it never 
Withers away or dies, — 

I never saw one. 

They sav 
A bird of foreign lands, — the condor, 

l^ever alights, 
Bnt through the air unceasingly will wander, 
In long, aerial flights, — 

I never saw one. 

They say 
That in Egyptian deserts, massive, 

Half buried in the sands. 
Swept by the hot sirocco,^ grand, impassive. 
The statue of colossal Memnon^ stands, — 
I never saw it. 

I An oppressive wind from the Lybian deserts, blowing over southern Europe. 
'-! An Ethiopian king killed by Achilles. A statue of him stands near Thebes. 



78 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

They say 
A land faultless, far off, and fairy, 

A summer land, with woods and glens and glades, 
Is seen where palms rise feathery and airy, 

And from whose lawns the sunlight never fades, — 
I never saw it. 

They say 
The stars make melody sonorous 

While whirling on their poles ; 
They say through space an interstellar^ chorus 
Magnificently rolls, — 

I never heard it. 

K'ow wha-. 
Care I for amaranth or condor. 

Colossal Memnon, or the fairy land. 
Or for the songs of planets as they wander 
Through arcs superlatively grand? — 
They are not real. 

Hope's idle 
Dreams the Real vainly follows. 

Facts stay as fadeless as the Parthenon;^ 
While fancies, like the smoky-tinted swallows, 

Flit gaily mid its arches and are gone. 

1 Among the stara. 

2 A celebrated marble temple of Athene on the Acropolis at Athens. 



SEI.ECTIONS FROM IRONQUILL 



79 



THALATTA.^ 
I. 

The gale blew from France, and a wasted moon 
Arose on the rim of a friendless sky. 

I stood by the mast while the midnight waves 
Invaded the deck with an angry cry. 

In tempest and swell as the steamer rolled, 

It tunneled its way through the foam and blast ; 

Like ravenous wolves were the hollow waves 
That hungered for me as they hurried past. 

There has come a new dream to me, 

It 's a dream — it 's a dream of the sea — 

A dream of the midnight sea. 

II. 

O horrible billows — O horrible night! 

The stoker,^ at home in the hell below. 
Was shoveling coal like a demon, stripped. 

While furnaces roared with a fervent glow. 

1 A Greek word, meaning "the ocean." 

SQn© who 18 employed to tend a furnace of a locomotive or steamship. 



80 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

When midnight is come, and mj prairie home 
Is lit by the moon's unassuming glance, 

When ravenous waves and unsteady deck 

Are set in the past, with the gales of France, 

Every once in a while to me 

Comes a dream, a strange dream of the sea — 

A dream of the midnight sea. 

III. 

I think that I may in a thousand years 
Remember the earth in its giddy course 

Still tunneling on through the cosmic^ waves, 
And breasting the storms of electric force. 

And then I may think: O the dreadful time 
I rode on the earth through the stellar^ sea; 

horrible night when the gales of fate 

And billows of force were a- whelming me! 



Perhaps there may come to me 
Strange dreams of the 
Of the interstellar sea. 



Strange dreams of the stellar sea- 



* Pertaining especially to the universe. 
2 Starry. 



SELECTIONS FHOM lEONQUILE 81 



THE BLUE-BIKD OF NOVEMBER 

The wind is howling w^ildlj, like a drove of lean kivntes ; 
The steel-clad, floating, freezing storm-clond from the 

nortluvest conies. 
I 'm in my cheerfnl office, reading poems, and my boots 
Are stuck up at the stove, which with a blazing hodfnl 

hums. 
I 'm reading of a blue-eyed, wandering, hopeful little 

princess looking for a home. 

I lay my book of poems upside down upon a chair — 
I step up to the window, where a box of fine-cut stands; 
Says I, " By jings, these princesses are getting mighty 

rare. 
And always have such dreadful times with lovers and 

with plans; 
I 'd like to see a useless, blue-eyed, wandering little 

princess looking for a home. 

" The world is full of sympathy, the world is full of 
homes ; 

The world is full of friendships, though hidden they 
may be; 

When gone are friends and sympathy, perforce the crea- 
ture roams, 

Invoking them, imploring them, at large, o'er land and 
sea." 

That 's what this sentimental poet writes about this blue- 
eyed little princess looking for a home. 
—6 



82 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

See here, you straggling blue-bird, hopping on the win- 
dow sill! 

You hop and flop and flutter, like a worn-out Greeley 
flag. 

You'd better hunt your roosting-place ; it's winter and 
it 's chill, 

And hoarse, bleak, evening ice-storms after one another 
tag. 

Says she, " Unhappy me ; I 'm nothing but a wandering, 
useless little blue-bird, hunting for a home." 

Says I, " Then skip for Texas, it is n't far away ; 

Go down to where the gulf mists through the orange 

branches troop; 
Fly off to where the sunshine dances on Aransas^ Bay, 
The winter-blooming Brazos,^ the vine-clad Guadelupe.^ 
If I were an itinerant,^ useless, homeless blue-bird, with 

your wings, I 'd find a home." 

Says she, " Speak not of Guadelupe, the Brazos, or the 

Bay— 
The winter-blooming prairies of that sunny-hearted zone; 
I have flown through orange branches, I have floated on 

the spray ; 
I discover no companions, and I find myself alone. 
I find myself a lonesome, sad, unsocial little blue-bird, 

longing for a home." 

^ A bay on tlie coast of Texas. 

2 A river of Texas, flowing into the Gulf of Mexico. 
8 A river of Texas, a branch of the San Antonio. 
* Wandering. 



SELECTIONS FROM lEONQUILL 83 

Into tlie raging stove I then did hurl a hod of coal, 

And raising up the winter-crusted sash-bar from the 
sill, 

Sajs I, " Your lonesome feelings I to some extent con- 
dole. 

Hop in; here's food and firelight, be a tenant at your 
will; 

And listen while I read a lovely, long-haired poem of a 
blue-eyed princess looking for a home. 

^' The world is full of happiness, the world is full of 
homes, 

The world is full of sympathy, though hidden it may be ; 

When gone are friends and sympathy, perforce the crea- 
ture roams, 

Princess or blue-bird, seeking them, over the land or 
sea." 

That's what this gifted, wild-eyed, transcendentaP poet 
says about his blue-eyed little princess looking for 
a home. 

The blue-bird entered gayly, then quicker than a wink 
She darted. out and left me, ere the window could be 

closed. 
I said, you little blue-bird, you 'd better stop and think ; 
But, then, you 're like these princesses. It 's just as I 

supposed. 
You'd be unhappy were you not a roaming, rambling, 

useless wanderer with no home. 

1 Vaguely extravagant In language. 



84 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 



LIFE'S MOONKISE. 

ISTo sunrise — no noon — no sunset; 

On the prairie, like a pall, 
All day hangs the storm, and from it 

Unhappiness seems to fall. 

At evening the sky grows cloudless. 

And the moon shines round and clear; 

While pure as the smiles of angels 
The glittering stars appear. 

The red deer and the primrose 
And the prairie-larks are gay, 

Till night, with its moonlit beauty. 
Is merged in the broad, bright day. 

Somes lives have a cloudy sunrise, 
With a noon-tide clear and bright; 

And some have a day of sunshine, 
With rainy and cheerless night. 

My life had been sad and rainy 

Through its long and somber day; 

At last came the placid moonrise 
And scattered ihe clouds away. 



SELECTIONS EROM lEONQUILL 85 

I 'm now in life's moonrise living ; 

And altliougli the sun lias set, 
There come to me no suggestions 

Of sorrow or vain regret. 

I 'm seeing new worlds and planets 

In the 0])Qn evening sky; 
Mj soul feels a wild, new daring 

As whisper the night-winds by. 

I 'm giving no thought to troubles, 

'Nov the past that flew away; 
But hoping the moonlit present 

May merge in the broad, bright day. 



YICTOK. 

He was a hero, fighting all alone; 

A lonesome warrior — never one more brave, 

Discreet, considerate, and grave. 

He fought some noble battles; but he gave 
No voice to fame, and passed away unknown. 

So grandly to occasions did he rise. 

So splendid were the victories he planned, 
That all the world had asked him to command 
Could it his native valor understand: 

He fought himself, and, winning, gained the prize. 



86 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 



THE VIOLET STAR. 

" I have always lived, and I always must/' 
The sergeant said when the fever came ; 
Erom his burning brow we washed the dust, 

And we held his hand, and we spoke his name. 

'^ Millions of ages have come and gone," 

The sergeant said as we held his hand — 

^' They have passed like the mist of the early dawn 
Since I left my home in that far-off land." 

We bade him hush, but he gave no heed — 
" Millions of orbits I crossed from far, 

Drifted as drifts the cottonwood seed; 
I came," said he, " from the Violet Star. 

" Drifting in cycles from place to place — 

I 'm tired," said he, "and I 'm going home 
To the Violet Star, in the realms of space 
Where I loved to live, and I will not roam. 

" Eor I 've always lived, and I always must, 

And the soul in roaming may roam too far; 
I have reached the verge that I dare not trust. 
And I'm going back to the Violet Star." 



SELECTIOJNIS FEOM IBONQUILL 87 

The sergeant was still, and we fanned his cheek; 

There came no word from that soul so tired; 
And the bugle rang from the distant peak, 

As the morning dawned and the pickets^ fired. 

The sergeant was buried as soldiers are; 

And we thought all daj as we marched through the 
dust : 
" His spirit has gone to the Violet Star — 

He always has lived, and he always must." 



PEAIKIE CHILDREK 

This is the duchess of Lullaby Laud, 

Lying asleep on the velvety sward ; 

That is an indigo flower in her hand, 

T^^pical emblem of rank and command, 

Symbol heraldic of lady and lord. 

That is her brother asleep at her side; 

He is a duke; and his little red hand 
Grapples the ragged old rope that is tied 
Into the collar of Rover, the guide — 

Rover, the hero of Lullaby Land. 

1 Guards of the outer lines of a camp. 



88 TWENTIETH CENTUKY CLASSICS 

Fishes come out of the water and walk, 

Chipmunks play marbles in Lullaby Land. 
Rabbits rise up on the prairies and talk, 
Goslings go forward and giggle and gawk — 
Everything chatters and all understand. 

After awhile he will sail on the sea — 

Little red duke on the prairie asleep; 
Daring the shot and the shell, he shall be 
Admiral, fighting for you and for me — 

riying the flag o'er the dangerous deep. 

Down at the Lido,^ where billows are blue; 

Back through the vineyards to Florence^ and Kome;^ 
That is our duchess, whom both of us knew ; 
That is her husband, so tender and true. 

Taking her far from her babyhood home. 

Children at play on the prairies to-day. 
Bravely to-morrow will enter the race. 

Trusting the future whose promises say, 
" Courage and effort will work out a way. 
Fortune and fame are not matters of place." 

1 The Lido is a great watering-place down on the Adriatic bar in front of Venice. 

2 A city of southern Italy. 

3 The capital of Italy. 



SELECTIONS FROM IRONQUILL 



CHILDHOOD. 

It passed in beauty, 

Like the waves that reach 
Their jeweled fingers 

Up the sanded beach. 

It passed in beauty 

Like the flowers that spring 
Behind the footsteps 

Of the winter king. 

It passed in beauty, 
. Like the clouds on high, 
That drape the ceilings 
Of the summer sky. 



THE TOBACCO-SXEMMEKS.- 

Stemming tobacco in a reeking basement, 

At work, with little left of hopes or joys, 
Were silent groups of many shaded faces, 
Their blood the sewage of barbaric races. 
Women and girls, old men and sober boys. 

In the vast basement the reluctant ceilings 

Were propped by pillars weary with delay ; 
The mid-day light shrank from the poisoned vapors, 
While feeble jets lit, as with ghostly tapers. 
The woeful scenes where life was worked away. 



89 



90 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLASSICS 

Looking around, my angry heart protested. 

" How," I inquired, " are such conditions made ? 
What human laws betray such soulless phases? 
Are these the victims of crime's stern ukases^ ? " 

The foreman said : " ISTo ; of the laws of trade." 

Then of myself my soul did ask the question : 
Would I work here and earn my daily bread? 

■ Would I toil here to make an ^' honest living " ; 

And, at the end of lock-stepped^ hours, forgiving, 
Go sleepfully and dreamlessly to bed? 

E'oting my thoughts, the foreman gave a signal; 

A silence fell at once on every tongue ! 
Tlien suddenly a low and rhythmic murmur 
Broke forth into a cadence strong and firmer. 

And in it joined the aged and the young. 

The rats peered from their holes. The oaken pillars. 

Smoky and stained, began, to vibrate white ; 
And still the song ro^e up in wild derision 
Of present things, and claimed with strange decision, 
There is a land of restful peace and right. 

The song transformed the walls to pallid onyx. 
The rafters changed to maze of antique oak. 
The sodden floor grew firm and tessellated. 
And in the stead of vapor, poison-freighted. 
An incense rose with faint and filmy smoke. 

1 A proclamation in Russia having the force of law. 

2 A mode of marching by a body of men, stepping as closely as possible in such a 
manner that the legs of each move with the corresponding legs of the person before. 



SELECTIONS FEOM IRONQUILL 91 

My soul retains that song's redundant sorrow; 

There may be justice somewhere — who can tell? 
Perhaps the captor he, who wears the fetter, 
Perhaps the torch and steel were not the better, 

To be the wronged, perhaps, were just as well. 

Perhaps these lives of ours, when sere and withered. 
May be picked over in some juster land, 

Torn from the earthly stem and there inspected — 

By the aroma of good deeds selected — 

Perhaps it 's so. We do not understand. 

Work on, sing on, O toilers. May the future 
Pestore the world to him who works and sings. 

May justice come inflexibly decreeing 

The ample right of every human being 
To happiness and hope in present things. 



TWENTIETH CENTUitY CLASSICS 



THE EHYMES OF IRONQUILL. 

I've alius held — till jest of late — that Poetry and me 

Got on best, not to 'sociate — that is, most poetry ; 

But t'other day my Son-in-law, who 'd ben in town to mill. 

Fetched home a present, like, fer Ma : — The Rhymes of Ironquill. 

He used to teach ; and course his views ranks over common-sense ; 
That 's biased me till I refuse 'most all he rickcommends : 
But Ma she read and read along, and cried, like women will. 
About "The Washerwoman's Song" in Rhymes of Ironquill. 

And then she made me read the thing, and found my specs and all ; 
And I jest leant back there, I jing ! my cheer against the wall, 
And read and read, and read and read, all to myse'f, ontil 
I lit the lamp and went to bed with Rhymes of Ironquill I 

I propped myse'f up there, and — Durn ! — I never shet an eye 
Till daylight I — hogged the whole concern, tee total, mighty nigh ! — 
I 'd sigh sometimes, and cry sometimes, er laugh jest fit to kill — 
Clean captured, like, with them-air Rhymes of that-air Ironquill I 

Read that-un 'bout old " Marmaton " 'at hain 't ben ever sized 

In song before — and yit 's rolled on jest same as 'postrophized ! — 

Putt me in mind of our old crick at Freeport ; and the mill ; 

And Hinchman's Ford— till jest home-sick ! them Rhymes of Ironquill I 

Read that-un too — 'bout game o' whist — and likenin' Life to fiin 
Like that — and playin' out yer fist, however cards is run : 
And them " Tobacker-Stemmers' Song" they sung with sich a will, 
Down 'mongst the misery and wrong, O Rhymes of Ironquill I 

And old " John Brown," who broke the sod of Freedom's fallor field 
And sowed his heart there, thankin' God pore slaves 'ud git the yield I— 
Rained his last tears for them, and us, to irrigate and till 
A crop of songs as glorious as Rhymes of Ironqiiill ! 

And, sergeant, died there in the War, 'at talked, out of his head — 
He went "back to the Violet Star," I '11 bet ! — jest like he said 1— 
Yer wars kin riddle bone and flesh, and blow out brains, and spill 
Life-blood — but somepin' lives on, fresh as Rhymes of Ironquill ! 

Jambs Whitcomb Riley. 



SELECTIONS FROM IRONQUILL 



93 



ADIEU. 

Oft the resonance of rhymes 

Future hearts and distant times* 

May impress; 

Shall humanity to me, 

Like my Kansas prairies, be 

Echoless ? 

Ikonquiel. 



Books That Will Help You. 



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No. 3, from October 27, 1894, to August 23, 1895. 

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No. 6, from January, 1898, to October, 1898. 

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1899 List, 136 Titles. Price, 30 Cents, Postage Prepaid. 



Alice's Adventures in Won- 
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